Apple will appeal to the Supreme Court in ebooks price fixing antitrust case

Apple will appeal to the Supreme Court in ebooks price fixing antitrust case, according to which the tech giant conspired with book publishers to fix the price of e-books. In 2013, the Cupertino-based company was sued by the U.S. Department of Justice along with 33 states and territories and lost the case.

At that time, Denise Cote, the U.S. District Court Judge found that Apple broke the law by convincing major publishers to take up the same “agency pricing model” in which they set their own prices and agreed not to offer lower prices elsewhere. Due to this, the prices of some e-books rose.

Apple said in its filing that at the launch of iPad, Amazon controlled nearly 90 percent of the ebook market and used its power to sell some books below cost. In order to compete with Amazon, Apple did that.

The company will have to pay $450 million if the Supreme Court declines to hear the case. If the U.S court will hear the case, Apple will argue that its actions were not anticompetitive.

Apple will appeal to the Supreme Court and writes:

“This question is exceedingly important to the United States economy as it concerns the rules that will govern disruptive entry by dynamic companies into new or stagnant markets.”

Apple will appeal to the Supreme Court in ebooks price fixing antitrust case, but it hasn’t submitted its formal request to the High Court yet. The company has asked for a 30-day extension to do so and if the request is granted, the Cupertino-based company will have until October 28 to appeal the Supreme Court to overturn the rulings of the lower court.